The Approach That I Followed

To complete the project I followed the Jesse James Garrett’s method knows as the Elements of User Experience. This method allowed us to cut through the complexity of user-centred design. W e decided to use this method as gave us the big picture of the user experience development, from strategy and requirements to information architecture and visual design.

Research

I began by investigating the broader travel booking landscape, looking at both established platforms and emerging digital travel services. I focused on understanding how travelers plan, book, and manage experiences in a way that feels quick, reliable, and enjoyable.

My main goal was to explore the role a modern booking platform can play in supporting travelers who value both efficiency and inspiration. I wanted to understand how a digital solution could provide a seamless, premium, and trustworthy booking journey — empowering users to make confident choices that fit their personal travel needs and preferences.

Competitive Analysis

By conducting a competitive analysis we discovered the following:

• All three platforms — Atlas Obscura, Tripadvisor, and Culture Trip — offer a core set of features, including a website, mobile app, and access to travel content or recommendations.
• Only one of them consistently focuses on lesser-known destinations, but even that leans more toward quirky or unusual spots rather than elegant or relaxing alternatives.
• None of the platforms specialize in suggesting quiet, beautiful urban alternatives to mainstream tourist cities, and none guide users from discovery all the way through booking in a calm, curated interface.
• These findings helped me identify both common standards in the travel inspiration space and clear gaps — particularly around serenity, crowd-avoidance, and curation — that present a strong opportunity for Hidden Gem to differentiate itself.

User Interview

From my initial research, it became clear that modern travelers are seeking more than just popular destinations — they’re increasingly looking for authenticity, balance, and moments of peace within their journeys. To understand this shift more deeply, I surveyed five participants with varying travel behaviors, from relaxed getaways to cultural city trips.

I aimed to explore their preferences, planning habits, and frustrations, especially around finding destinations that feel rewarding yet not overrun by crowds. Many participants expressed a strong interest in quiet, beautiful, and lesser-known places, especially when their goal was to relax, recharge, or escape the stress of everyday life.

Summary Takeaways

These interviews helped validate the need for a platform that saves time, avoids the noise of typical tourist guides, and introduces users to authentic, beautiful, crowd-free places. While people still value cultural landmarks, there is a growing desire for restful, aesthetic, and immersive travel experiences — especially in cities that aren't constantly overrun.

Affinity Mapping Sessions

I began with the first stage of the design process — aiming to develop an empathic understanding of the problem I was trying to solve. This involved exploring various research methods to uncover meaningful insights and guide my design decisions.

Secondary Research

As part of the affinity mapping process, I conducted secondary research using reviews from Trustpilot, Google Reviews, and travel-specific platforms like Tour Radar. The goal was to uncover common patterns in user satisfaction and frustration across various travel platforms.

Key frustrations included - misleading content, technical glitches, booking difficulties, and poor customer support, especially with platforms like Tripadvisor, Atlas Obscura, and Culture Trip. Notably, users often drew a clear line between poor digital experiences (buggy websites, lack of responsiveness, broken features) and high-quality on-the-ground tours that were well-organized and memorable.

In contrast, top-rated platforms like TravelPerk, G Adventures, and Trafalgar demonstrated the value of a streamlined, transparent, and reliable booking process, supported by strong UX design and excellent customer service. These findings helped guide the affinity mapping session by highlighting recurring themes around trust, usability, expectation gaps, and the importance of seamless digital-to-physical experiences in the travel platform.


User Personas & Journey Maps

Below are the two proto personas–and their overlapping goals, motivations, needs, and pain points.

Problem Statement

After synthesizing insights from my research, surveys, and user journey mapping, I identified a key opportunity for the Hidden Gem platform: helping modern travelers find peaceful, beautiful, and culturally rich destinations without the overwhelm of mainstream travel planning tools. This became the foundation for the core problem statement and informed all subsequent design decisions.

Design Principles

My research insights helped me determine that the solution should deliver the following key benefits for users of Hidden Gem.

Context Scenario

Riley, a 34-year-old solo traveler, is planning her next short trip while balancing a demanding remote job. She’s been feeling mentally drained and wants a peaceful getaway to recharge, but doesn’t have the time or energy to dig through endless travel blogs, tourist guides, or influencer content. Ella is tech-savvy and loves discovering places that feel authentic and under-the-radar, but she often spends hours trying to find options that match her preferences: quiet, beautiful, walkable cities that still offer cafés, public transport, and a bit of culture.

Today, she has a short window between work calls and wants to quickly explore calm destination ideas for a weekend trip — ideally something close to a train route, not too crowded, and visually inspiring. Her main concern is wasting time on generic platforms that promote the same popular cities. She’s looking for a tool that lets her filter by atmosphere and convenience, so she can discover and book a destination without overthinking it.